


All of Our Tomorrows

by PyrophobicDragon



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Domestic, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-11
Updated: 2018-04-11
Packaged: 2019-04-21 14:01:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14286474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PyrophobicDragon/pseuds/PyrophobicDragon
Summary: Some years later, they retire.(A self-indulgent fic of pure domestic fluff)





	All of Our Tomorrows

**Author's Note:**

> Got the hankering to write something domestic.
> 
> Jump down to the end for a mild warning.

Fjord had been the one to bring it up.

“Maybe we should retire.”

Addressed to Caleb, who was sitting upright in his bed. He’s really only speaking to Caleb, but nonetheless, everyone’s head rises to look at him.

Fjord does not look up. He continues to stare at his work, slowly whittling down the piece of wood in his hands, sending sawdust and shavings onto the floor of the inn.

“Retire?” Molly prompts, when no other information is brought forward.

Fjord nods slowly. Still keeping his eyes on his handiwork, even though his motions were smooth and practiced. He’s helped carved peg legs hundreds of times before, watched them being made or repaired thousands of times. He still focuses, though. This one needed to be perfect.

“Yeah. Thinking this line of work is getting too dangerous.”

Curled up at the foot of Caleb’s bed, Nott sits up, eyes narrowing. “Fjord, if you’re going to say that Caleb is a _liability--_ ”

That finally makes Fjord look up, alarmed. “No! No, I’m not,” he says quickly. He hesitates for half a moment, then finally looks over at Caleb, who is listening with that subtly stricken expression of his. “I’m just--” He starts and stops a few times. Then he finally picks up Caleb’s hand from where it was lying limply on the sheets. Squeezing it, he finally murmurs, “I realized...I was scared to lose you.”

“Why now? I mean, Caleb’s been knocked unconscious plenty of times before,” Beau asks. She turns away from the window to face Fjord. She tries to cross her arms, the way she does, but she winces when the motion pulls her bad shoulder, especially stiff after having to roll out of the way of the explosion. She settles for propping one hand on her hip instead.

Jester replies, “I think we all know why now, Beau.” Her normally chipper demeanor is muted. She leans over to pat Caleb’s calf, and visibly flinches when her hand meets nothing but bedsheet. “Oh, Caleb, I’m so sorry--”

“No, no, don’t be,” Caleb interrupts her smoothly with a small smile.

“You know, for someone who just lost their leg, you’re not reacting the way most people do. Are you sure you’re alright?” Molly asks, brow furrowed. He’s had his concerned expression on ever since they escaped. “You know...up here.” He pauses in his careful stretches to tap his temple. Like Beau, he’s no longer as nimble as he acts like he is. It’s nothing magic or a healing potion can heal. It’s just time catching up to them.

Caleb shrugs in response. “I can still read, I can still remember things very clearly, I can still hold my books and pet my cat and cast my spells. As far as things to lose go, my leg is honestly the least of my concerns.” He reaches out and pats the stump under the blanket. His whole foot and most of his calf was gone, with only the knee and a little bendable bit remaining. He makes eye contact with Molly for a brief moment. “It is quite Scheisse, ja, but we escaped with our lives and most of my limbs and I am not currently dying of infection.” His blue eyes slide over to Fjord and he gently prompts, “You want to retire?”

Fjord nods. He doesn’t let go of his hand. “Yeah. I was thinking--we’ve done pretty good for ourselves. I know I’ve gotten done everything I was hoping to get done, even if it wasn’t the way I was expecting it to go. We have those handy little pensions, so I’m none to worried about cash, even if you want to spend it all on expensive books and scrolls and shit. I guess I’m just getting a bit tired of adventuring.” Rubbing his thumb across the back of Caleb’s hand, he quietly continues, speaking as if they were the only two people in the room. “And I know you still get antsy. But I thought--I hoped that we could settle down.”

Caleb’s not-looking at him again. Fjord waits patiently, still rubbing his hand, as Caleb considers his words. Finally, he looks up and says, “I think...I am ready to stop running.”

Nott butts in. “I’m coming with you, of course.”

Caleb smiles at her as Fjord nods vigorously. “Of course! We wouldn’t have it any other way. We might have to find somewhere a bit secluded, but I was already considering a quiet place so we wouldn’t get bothered by folks. I wouldn’t force you to leave Caleb--you’re family.”

Nott beams at Fjord. Beau interrupts their tender moment by holding out her hand and going, “Whoa, whoa, whoa whoa...what about the rest of us?”

“Yeah! Are we invited?” Jester asks eagerly.

Fjord stares at the others, looking around. They all have similar expressions to Jester--eager, waiting for his response. “Well, I wasn’t going to--it’s up to you, I guess, but I figured the four of you would want to continue your travels.”

“We’d be losing half our group. I’m not keen on breaking up a good unit again,” Molly says.

Jester nods, clasping her hands together. “You’re like family.”

“And besides,” Beau says. “I’m ready to stop running too.”

By the door, Yasha looks down. “I think--I think I’ll still travel.” She looks up, eyes roaming over the group, and continues, “But it would be nice...to have a place to return to.”

“Then it’s settled, I think, ja?” Caleb smiles at Fjord. His eyes are strained and tired, face still streaked with flecks of blood, but his smile is warm. “I think it’s time for us to retire.”

 

***

 

They don’t settle down right away, of course.

They still need to find a good place to call home. As they travel around the Empire, they still pick up odd jobs. Each close call only serves to reinforce Fjord’s determination to find someplace soon.

His resolve peaks at every sundown, when Caleb sits down, removes the wooden leg, and massages the stump. That damn leg causes too many worries, too many stumbles and near-falls, and every day he can see the feelings of inadequacy and guilt deepen the lines of permanent exhaustion around Caleb’s eyes.

Most nights, Caleb staunchly refuses any medicine to help with the pain, a lifetime of deprivation leaving him unwilling to “waste” precious resources on himself. But some nights, when the grinding of his teeth is audible, Jester forces Caleb to drink a cup of poppy-seed milk, oftentimes resorting to recruiting Yasha to physically hold him down as she pours the tincture into his mouth, much to his vocal displeasure. “If you agreed to drink it like a normal person we wouldn’t have to do this,” she says every time, hands on her hips. Fjord looks away from their little scene and tells himself, _Tomorrow, tomorrow will be the day._

It takes more than a month of tomorrows.

Three day’s travel from the border of the Menagerie Coast, they find a house. It’s an hour’s walk, Caleb-pace, from the nearest town, less by cart, and even quicker by horse. A quick investigation around the town reveals conflicting histories of its presence--an old hunter’s lodge, a military base, or maybe an inn. Regardless of its origins, it was long abandoned and no one particularly minded if a group of travelling strangers looking for a home took it over.

The first floor is mostly an open space, with a kitchen and a hearth, but some of the space is taken up by two rooms. The second floor is entirely made up of rooms and a hallway. There’s an attic and a basement, and a bathroom and latrine jut out from the side of the house.

“This is literally _perfect,_ you guys,” Jester gushes, leaning over the staircase railing to look down at Fjord and Caleb.

“I’m inclined to agree,” Fjord replies absently.

Yasha passes Jester and heads down the stairs. “I think--”

Whatever she thinks is promptly waylaid when she steps on a certain spot on the wooden stairs and is sent crashing down.

Three more heads pop into view over the railing. For a long moment everyone digests the view of Yasha stuck waist-deep in rotted wood.

“Well,” Molly says cheerfully, “it’s a fixer-upper.”

They purchase wood and nails and tools from the town. They rip up and replace floorboards, reinforce walls, add locks and deadbolts to the doors. They plan out furniture, rooms, household goods, food, supplies, all while Caleb and Molly walk around the house, performing rituals to banish any lingering malevolent spirits from the house and the surrounding areas.

As one final spell, Caleb walks around the exterior of the house, rubbing together chalk, leaving a trail of white dust. Carrying the seven iron keys that would grant access to the house on a silver thread, he completes the circle at the front door and steps inside. With the protection ritual finished, he hands out the keys.

Beau turns the key over in her hands. “Now it feels…”

“Permanent,” says Yasha.

“Real,” says Nott.

“Crazy,” says Molly. He tosses his key up in the air, catches it, and hangs it on his belt. “I’ve never had my own housekey before.”

“Me neither,” says Caleb, “we were too poor to have anything worth stealing, and locksmiths are expensive.”

There’s a brief silence. Half of their party is staring at him, the other half are merely nodding in agreement.

“Okay, guys,” Beau says, “Raise your hand if this is the first house key you’ve ever owned.”

Everyone except her and Jester raise their hands.

“Gods, we’re such messes.”

Fjord chuckles and nods. He carefully hangs the key on his belt, then makes a shooing motion with his hands. “All right, everyone go get some sleep. We still have a long ways to go before this place feels like home.”

Slowly, slowly, a transformation happens.

Fjord’s furniture is sturdy yet beautiful. Years of working on various ships taught him some measure of woodworking, both for practical reasons and to alleviate boredom. The beds were more practical than anything, given everyone was getting a bit tired of sleeping on the floors, but the dining room table and chairs he was working on are slowly shaping up to be elegant. His next project, he tells anyone who drops by, is to make a rocking chair, because Nott and Jester spotted one during a trip to town and had both nearly fallen asleep right there in broad daylight. It should be stressful, getting so many pieces of furniture ready as quickly as he can, but the work is soothingly familiar and repetitive and Beau is a big help after he teaches her the basics. When he needs a break from the smell of sawdust, he wanders off to stand with the horses, brushing their manes, or he goes to find Caleb.

Most of Beau’s initial solo attempts are relegated to the fireplace to be burned or the scrapheap to be reused. Under Fjord’s tutelage, she eventually creates a piece she deems worthy of her own standards--an easel that she gifts to Jester. After that, she’s content to leave the bulk of the furniture-making to Fjord, stepping in to assist him often, but for her own projects she concentrates on creating simple items to populate the house: shelves, plain wooden frames to hold Jester’s paintings, a rack to hang on the side of the house for Yasha’s tools. Being so stationary is not something she’s used to, but she distracts herself successfully with the excitement of seeing things she made slowly start decorating the house. It gets rough on her shoulder sometimes, but she stretches it out and soldiers on.

Yasha quietly putters around the garden. In a matter of weeks, little green shoots are already starting to push out from the soil. Most of the plants are vegetables and herbs, but she spends careful moments tending to the line of sprouts against the house wall, looking forward to returning from a trip and seeing a bright line of flowers. She can and will spend hours kneeling in the soil, plucking weeds and pests or simply sitting in the sunshine. She’s planning on leaving soon. She really is. But first she wants to get the garden established, first she wants to teach the others how to care for it in her stead, first she wants to watch as Fjord and Beau slowly fill their home with furniture and first she wants to decorate her very own room and first...

Jester’s goal is to fill the house with soft things. She drapes her handmade blankets over every flat surface. While happy to sew together crazy quilts and knit wild patterns, she tries to be mindful that this is their house and they need calm and peace as much as they joy and laughter as she selects fabric. The living room gets a warm, dark red rug. She hangs up two sets of curtains: sheer white lace inside heavy black in case they need to hide from strangers. When her eyes strain from staring at the thin threads, she sets down her needlework and heads upstairs, throwing open a window to let in fresh air as she paints, or sits down on the floor to write a letter to her mother telling her about Nott’s first cooking attempt in a real kitchen, Beau showing off her muscles as she chops wood in front of Yasha, Caleb walking outside, watching Fjord sweat over his work for a few minutes, then striding over, pulling him down for a kiss, and dragging him into their bedroom. Every night, as they bed down in their own private bedrooms (and she misses rooming with Beau, sometimes, but when she does she can just sneak over and knock and Beau or sometimes Yasha would let her in) she curls up, holding her talisman, and prays to the Traveller. And every night she tells him _thank you, thank you for giving us this peace._

Establishing a routine is weird for Molly at first. He hides his discomfort by laughing too loudly, teasing the others, heading into town when sitting still watching the others putter around gets to be too much. Slowly, somehow, he learns how to relax, to take it slow. He starts spending a lot more time in the woods, foraging or hunting. A trip to the town procures a fishing rod, and soon he starts coming home with fish and game and mushrooms that Caleb won’t let them eat until he tests them for poison. Sometimes someone comes with him, most often Caleb-and-Nott or Yasha, and while wandering through the woods with someone to chat with is lovely, he enjoys the solitude just as much. It pleases him inexorably to watch as his friends eat the fruit of his explorations. He’s also the one who tends to do town trips the most often, given his naturally sociable nature, and he comes home with letters and books and more supplies and random gifts that he saw in the market and decided to pick up. Bringing his packages or his basket in, seeing everyone’s eyes light up as they run over to investigate what he brought this time makes him feel like a provider. Makes him feel like someone they rely on.

Nott’s self-appointed job, as it always has been, is to take care of Caleb. She sits at his side when he’s reading and listens to his voice weave tales of histories or instructions of spells. When she decides he’s been inside for far too long, she takes his arm and supports him on a jaunty walk around the house or into the woods, carefully matching his slowed pace and using her sharp eyes and mage hand to remove rocks and sticks and other potential tripping hazards. Soon, her concern over Caleb pushes her outside her comfort zone (as it often does) and she finds herself standing in the kitchen, staring at a piece of paper that contains a recipe that Caleb’s father used to make, steeling herself as she prepares to enter a different sort of battleground. Her first attempt at making a real meal goes...astonishingly well. The others thank her effusively and Caleb smiles a smile that is part melancholy and part gratitude, and before she knows it she’s collecting recipes and requesting ingredients and tasting and adjusting and standing on a step ladder made by Beau to reach the oven to bake homemade bread. The smell of her cooking floods the whole house, and when she thinks about the stories Caleb tells her sometimes about his home, about his mother and father, about how homesick he feels sometimes when he thinks about all he lost and all she never got to experience, and she thinks that this is what a perfect home is like.

(And when she gets the itch, she can follow Molly into town. This close to the border, there’s plenty of grumpy traders and travelers who stay in town that she can lift small things from, knowing that she’d never see them again.)

Caleb does what he loves the most: he studies. There’s a very nice general store in town whose proprietor has connections all over the place, and she was willing to order in nearly everything he could ask for when provided the coin. Fjord is taking a while to build him a desk--knowing him, he wants to make sure it’s “perfect”--but he’s worked for many years without one just fine. He’s happy to sit on the floor or at the dining table as he reads, with Frumpkin around his neck or winding his way around his feet and Nott sitting at his side. He reads stories out loud to her and whoever stops by to listen. Sometimes Nott will take him outside, sometimes they’ll follow Molly into the forest to gather berries or fiddleheads or dubious mushrooms, sometimes he’ll sit in the garden and learn how to care for their garden from Yasha. Oftentimes he’ll go out on his own accord to just look at Fjord and watch him work. Retirement suits him, he thinks privately. He’s still jittery, still paranoid, still sad and broken. But it fills an ache inside him that’s been hurting for so long that he’s forgotten that it was there among all the other bits of rubble that composes him.

Before they know it, a month passes. Then another. Then another.

Six months later, the first flurries of snow fall outside the window as Caleb reluctantly closes his book and starts gathering up the mess he made on the dining table. He has a desk now in his and Fjord’s room, but he likes working in the main room. The days are getting colder, and he finds that their room is chilly without Fjord there. The main room had the advantage of the hearth, Nott’s watchful eye, and the strangely welcoming bustle of people moving back and forth and in and out.

Limping back to their room to drop off his stuff, he passes Beau and her stack of plates. These are the plain wooden ones Molly carved. They have a full tableware set that Jester’s mother sent them as a part of her housewarming gifts, but those are porcelain and come in too many sizes with gravy boats and crystal wine glasses of different shapes and silver--actual silver!--cutlery. Needless to say, the majority of their party were uncomfortable using such fine table settings, and most of the time they lived in a locked and spelled chest in the kitchen. On special occasions they’ll break out few pieces, but they have yet to use the full set.

After leaving his books on the shelf, he heads back out into the kitchen, where Nott was standing on her little step ladder, peering into the oven. The whole room smelled heavenly, and he stops to ruffle her hair before heading to the shelf that had all their day-to-day dishware.

When he has seven bowls stacked up in his hands, two green arms loop around suddenly and snatch the stack from him. He smiles as he feels a kiss pressing into his hair. “I’ll take these,” Fjord murmurs. “Grab the utensils.”

As he pulls away from his back, Caleb rolls his eyes, but grabs a handful of forks anyways. He understands exactly what Fjord is doing: preventing him from carrying anything that would require two hands, so he could catch himself if he fell over. Some days, he resents how conscious everyone is of him, but today, he can let it slide.

Making his way carefully over to the table, he takes a seat as he sets the forks into their proper places. Molly slides into the seat next to him, carrying two of the crystal glasses. At Caleb’s aside glance, he only grins. “It’s a special occasion.” From underneath his still ostentatious coat, as if by magic, he pulls out two bottles of fancy wine and sets them on the table. From the various pockets, he pulls out the other glasses as well. They shine, looking out of place among the wooden dishes and iron utensils. At least Fjord’s table looked handsome.

One by one, the others settle into their spots around the table. Caleb stands up again, but he’s pulled down by Fjord, who gets up and heads to the kitchen in his stead. There’s a flurry of motion inside, then Fjord returns, carrying a pan with roast beef and vegetables. Caleb’s heart lifts when he sees the excitement in his friends’ faces. Nott comes out of the kitchen next with a cast iron pot of soup. She sets it on the table then scurries back into the kitchen, emerging with a loaf of bread and an apple tart. As she sets down those two dishes and takes her rightful seat on Caleb’s other side, Molly stands up and opens up one of the wine bottles. With a smile, he pours everyone their drink, then sets down the bottle and picks up his glass.

“Shall we toast, then?”

Fjord stands up as well, picking up his glass. “A toast to six months.”

Yasha is the next to stand. “To our first winter.” With an excited glint to her eye, she adds, “Winter will be the true test of our house and our skill.”

“Well, to not freezing to death, I guess.” Beau rises.

Jester jumps to her feet. “To everyone, for making this beautiful house and this beautiful life!”

Nott stutters, “Uh-I don’t know what to say now! Everyone else took all the good ones!”

Molly chuckles. “How about to Caleb for sacrificing his leg to get us to this point?”

“I’m not saying that!” Nott glares daggers at him. He merely chuckles. She dawdles a little, then raises her glass into the air. “To Fjord, for saying what we were all thinking seven months ago.”

Fjord blushes. Caleb smiles at Nott, then at Fjord, and stands up. Immediately, they both grab for his elbows, stabilizing him. He raises his glass and looks around the table. “To six months...and to many more.”

_Clink_

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: A character lost part of their leg offscreen.


End file.
